Photo by Alberto Pezzali / NurPhoto via Getty Images Talking with a group of neoconservatives in Washington in the run-up to the US-led invasion of Iraq, I asked what the next target for regime change would be. They were unanimous: “Saudi Arabia.” The kingdom urgently needed modernising to become a constitutional democracy. “That,” I was told, “is what the Saudi people want.” It was a moment of high comedy. Saudi Arabia and the United States have radically different origins and historical trajectories. American government was founded in 1776 on a basis of Protestant Christianity and English common law, the Saudi...